Just had a week in Puglia, and travelled by rail in stages between Lecce and Trani (north of Bari).

Couldn't get over how much Permanent Way equipment was on view - piles of new concrete (and some old wooden) sleepers, and overhead line support columns at many stations, and some dedicated vast PW yards.

A selection of PW machines at Brindisi Centrale.

This piece of hoisting cage equipment in particular caught my eye - I was hoping they might work their way nearer to me, but they stopped and went back!

The top of the cage has now extended outwards to the right - don't know if any counter-weight jacks were in use.

There's a lot of various equipment in the UK though it is often spread out. Also due to security any such equipment that is stored for periods of time need to be in out of the way locations.Yes, the UK does have weed killer trains. In the1980's they had 4 wheel tankers with weed killer and water (At least three tankers) and one or two old LNER passenger coaches used for the train crew to work from. I'm slightly out of date as to what they have today as I left the railway about ten years ago.We have railgrinders, sandite layers, ballast washers and track layers, tampering machines, cranes and snow ploughs. Also railed road vehicles like diggers, JCB's, Lorries etc. You name it, we either have it or have tried it in the past.

Ooh. Very nice! During my time working trains there were many areas where the growth was so bad that one could not even risk looking out the cab windows. One place had growth in the four foot so thickly that one couldn't see the rails and this was a well used passenger branch line. On that line after I left the railways I heard of a poor PW worker who was sent to cut down some tall trees on the branch line that were around 60 ft high. They would climb up and cut the trees section at a time. On one such occasion a worker with years of experience didnt think and was sitting on the very branch he was cutting, and fell from a great height. It just goes to show how easily accidents can happen at times. He survived the fall. One fatality I got to hear about (Though I can't remember where this took place) was a railworker who was walking the rails concentrating to ensure that no train was coming. His attention was so focussed on this that as he walked over a level crossing he didnt see a car and he was killed. I nearly found myself in a similar situation once with a level crossing as one is concentrating on trains and doesn't think cars!